


when i was yours, you fled the scene

by realxeyez



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: F/F, F/M, hawke and surana are cousins dont question it, is the da fandom even alive bro, surana follows morrigan through the eluvian in witch hunt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-19
Updated: 2020-06-19
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:55:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,422
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24805783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/realxeyez/pseuds/realxeyez
Summary: he was meant for greater things, he thinks sometimes, something more than this. but he swallows the feeling down and resigns himself to a life at court.(if he imagines a woman with hair as dark as night by his side, regal and yet so humble, nobody ever notices. surana lives on in his thoughts and that is good enough.)
Relationships: Alistair/Female Surana (Dragon Age), Alistair/Female Warden (Dragon Age), Morrigan/Female Surana (Dragon Age), Morrigan/Female Warden (Dragon Age)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 15





	when i was yours, you fled the scene

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this eight months ago and then realised it wasnt half bad i only just remembered dragon age existed enjoy

the hero of ferelden is dead.   
  
a rumour that spread once warden commander surana left her post at vigil's keep after the battle of amaranthine. some said she was overcome with grief after two of her charges- and close friends- were killed defending the keep. others said she got tired of being a mage in a land that didn't- wouldn't accept her, and so she ran to antiva or tevinter or into the uncharted lands of thedas. _all she ever did was run,_ they would say, _ran from the circle, ran from ferelden, ran from the wardens._  
  
he supposes they're half right. surana ran from the circle and she ran from the wardens, but she didn't run from ferelden. oh, she'd like everyone to think that she did. _ferelden doesn't need me anymore_ , she had said, _i can do better things in amaranthine, in rebuilding the wardens._  
  
_you don't need me anymore_ is what she meant. she never cared about ferelden or amaranthine or the wardens- but what was left for her there? to be branded as a jilted lover or as an apostate seeking to poison ferelden, it's something she wouldn't have been able to deal with. he cannot blame her for leaving but it was always under the pretense that she'd come back despite it all- that underneath her uncaring facade, she still truly loved him.   
  
but when a runner brings news that the warden commander has been deemed missing, he's not sure if she does. the surana he knows- the one he loves- wouldn't disappear overnight.   
  
(what he doesn't realise is that the surana he loves is gone- and not just physically)  
  
they say her body was found in the dragonbone wastes, nestled in the jaw of a high dragon. he deems that rumour as false, she killed the high dragon that resided there almost six months ago. others say she ran off, away from civilisation. that whatever she found in the wastes changed her. her companions are found weeks later, relatively unharmed, and he rules that theory out. but these companions- a dalish warrior and a circle mage- they do not speak of their journey with surana. he offers protection in return for information, but the two elude his grasp. he wonders if all elves and mages are just like that.   
  
her fellow wardens offer no explanation either. nathaniel howe is the only one who will take the time to speak to him but he isn't much help. he doesn't know if he's relieved that even now, surana still doesn't speak of her plans. that maybe he was the only one to ever hear of her goals and wishes.   
  
it's selfish and he leaves vigil's keep after one too many lingering glares from a black haired dwarf and a lanky elven woman. they tell him to leave surana be, as if they know her better.  
  
_maybe they do_ , a voice whispers to him, _maybe surana trusted them more than she ever trusted you. maybe she loved them like she could never loved you._  
  
he doesn't leave it be. he sends his people to the wastes if only because eamon refuses to let him endanger himself. the soldiers speak of a mirror, dull and cracked and he remembers what the dalish elves spoke of clan sabrae- of a mirror and sickness and-  
  
he throws the report into the fire and orders a ceremony for the late hero of ferelden.   
  
many do not speak of their kings mourning. but there are whispers in the court, of elven mages and heirs and he ignores it like he always has. pretends it doesn't matter- because it truly doesn't. as far as everyone knows, neri surana is dead and now king alistair theirin can get on with his life without the guilt of a life not lived weighing on him.   
  
it seems they do not know their king as well as they like to think. he never forgets her, not really. he doubts he ever could.   
  
he is only nineteen when he meets her, and twenty one when she leaves him for good. and yet, despite their short time together he finds it hard to imagine a world without her, a world where she is not by his side.  
  
he doesn't have to imagine very hard, funnily enough.   
  
but he survives. he is not a bad king and he tries to do right by his country but there is always the lingering sense of _more_. that he was meant for greater things but he swallows the feeling down and resigns himself to a life at court.   
  
(if he imagines a woman with hair as dark as night by his side, regal and yet so humble, nobody ever notices. surana lives on in his thoughts and that is good enough.)  
  
six years pass in a flash. he grows weary but he is undeniably ferelden's king and he takes pride in it. there are still whispers but not about surana. he thinks he misses it. the qunari rebel in kirkwall, the orlesians pester him about whatnot and tevinter is as unruly as ever. he cannot say he cares much about politics but he'd rather something interesting happen every once in awhile.  
  
that comes in the form of a visit to kirkwall a year later, to speak to the city's temporary viscount and knight commander, meredith stannard. she isn't the interesting thing here- he has never cared for the templar order, much less kirkwall's. it's hawke who catches his eye, strolling up to him. she's all grins and snark and it aches, somewhere deep in his chest. hawke has her smile.   
  
he doesn't comment on her blonde companion's glare, nor the telltale sign of the blight in his veins. but hawke catches his gaze and her grin tightens as they turn to leave.   
  
_say hello to my dear cousin for me, won't you? tell her that we amells miss her terribly._  
  
the blonde grey warden follows after the black haired mage and alistair rides back to denerim in a haze.   
  
amell, he thinks. shit.   
  
he never pushes the subject even when the grey warden mage- anders, _her_ charge- blows up the kirkwall chantry and tosses the world into chaos. he turns a blind eye when redcliffe takes in a group of rebel mages led by an elven grey warden mage- and doesn't that just make eamon groan in annoyance.   
  
and then the conclave explodes and everything goes to shit a second time. hundreds are dead and the only survivor is an elf- he wonders what's with elven heroes these days- and they work to close the breach, forming the inquisition.   
  
he meets said inquisition only briefly, when they come to collect the mages in redcliffe. who were making deals with evil tevinters. he's not sure if it's a smart move on the herald's part or not but he supposes elves and heroes and mages go hand in hand. he mostly leaves them be- he's had enough of dealing with these sorts of things.  
  
haven falls, which pales in comparison to the fact that he's begun to hear his calling. he throws up in his washing chambers and he buries his face into his hands like he's nineteen again and _sobs_. he had twenty more years. ten, if he was unlucky.   
  
_not now,_ he thinks, _not without her._  
  
he rides to skyhold the next morning.   
  
he's surprised to see leliana as the inquisition's spymaster but seeing her only makes the ache in his chest grow painful. she speaks to him carefully, calculated and he cannot place her as the loving and caring woman she was in the blight.   
  
unlike most, hawke is amused when she catches wind of his visit but she never mentions _her._ she speaks of her brother, of her lover and of the ancient darkspawn but never of surana. he wonders whos sake its for. but it's refreshing to speak to someone who doesn't immediately cower at the sight of the king of ferelden, someone who doesn't care about what he thinks of them.   
  
sadly, many people do. he doesn't intend to stay in skyhold for long, but the ambassador persuades him to wait until the winter palace to leave. apparently the inquisitor being seen with the king of ferelden would do wonders for their reputation. he's not sure if he can deal with more rumours.  
  
but he agrees. and it's a decision he's thankful for- hawke and her brother discover that the calling they're hearing is false, manipulated by corypheus. he spends that night in his quarters, thumbing through the rose from all those years ago and he lets himself think about surana. he knows she isn't dead and even after everything, he hopes that if she's hearing the calling, that she realises it's fake. she does not deserve an early death.   
  
the weeks go by quickly. he offers up information about the grey wardens and not much else. he finds himself in the gardens most days, watching as the inquisitor busies himself with gardening. he reminds alistair of _her,_ if only a little. both weren't made for leadership, but taerahel has seemed to grow into it. the elf doesn't mind alistair watching him but neither say much. there's not much to say.   
  
there is, however, too much to say when he finally crosses paths with the commander of the inquisition. he's been avoiding the man ever since he spotted him in the war room. evidently the man had hoped alistair had forgotten about kinloch hold. (he doesn't think he ever could.)  
  
he speaks of apologies for surana and alistair feels sick. he wants to shout, to say that cullen lost any right to feel sorry about he or surana long ago but he just smiles apologetically and races back to his quarters. cullen doesn't approach him after that.   
  
he stops being sick in time for the winter palace, which ends up making him more sick. the game makes his head hurt and the whole murder plot is quickly reminding him of ostagar. but celene is happy he is there and he supposes that's good enough for the inquisitor.   
  
even if all these fawning woman are slowly driving him to madness.   
  
but it's halfway through the night that things go downhill. leliana suddenly pulls into herself, refusing to share any knowledge and outright refusing to acknowledge his existence. he writes it off as her being back in orlais after all this time but there's a familiar pull in his head and-   
  
grand duchess florianne is accused of attempted murder against her cousin, celene and briala are reunited and grand duke gaspard is executed. he wonders if all orlesian parties are like this.   
  
the inquisitor is talking to the empress when he sees her.  
  
_it's her it's her it's really her-_  
  
she's as every bit as beautiful as he remembers. she's older now, elegant and it shows. the sight of her almost brings in to his knees- dressed in warden blue and looking like a true royal and even the thought of her, a noble, a queen, makes his entire predicament even worse. she's stunning. more than stunning- words that he doesn't even know how to pronounce and more would never be able to describe her.  
  
and yet, here she is. after nine years, in orlais.   
  
he spares a look at leliana, who frowns at him and he realises that she knows- of course she knew. he wants to shout at her but she looks back up at the balcony overlooking at ballroom and there she is.  
  
not just surana.   
  
_morrigan._  
  
the sight is sickening, morrigan murmuring into surana's ear and he finally realises what surana's done, where she's been. leliana breathes sharply beside him and surana lifts up her eyes and meets his gaze and he-  
  
he runs.   
  
he makes it to the gates before surana catches up to him, out of breath.  
  
"alistair," she says, all breathy and gorgeous and it makes him fucking _sick_. she doesn't get to run after him- not after all the running shes done. he spins around to face her and the sight of her, frightened and concerned and _alive_ aches.   
  
"surana." he spits back and she flinches, like she doesn't expect him to be angry and well, he didn't expect himself to be angry either.   
  
"all this time," he murmurs, "i mourned you. we all did. this isn't fair to any of us."  
  
she takes a step back, dress swishing. "you weren't supposed to find me." she replies and it only serves to make him angrier.  
  
"you're in orlais. did you think we'd never find out? that we'd all just die, never knowing you were alive?" his voice cracks and everything aches.   
  
"yes?" she says it like it's obvious and he wonders where everything went wrong. how had they changed so drastically in such little time?   
  
"yes?" alistair echoes, "you made me king and then you _left_. all you've ever done is run-"  
  
"i did you a _favour._ " surana interrupts, taking a step closer. he's sure they're making a scene at this point and he can hear whispers of everyone who had followed the two of them out but he's too focused on the anger in surana's ocean blue eyes.   
  
"they would have you a pariah if it weren't for me. a knife eared apostate on the court? we both would've been dead."  
  
her reasoning means nothing to him. she acts like she left for the greater good- as if breaking his heart helped ferelden.   
  
"they would have me dead even now. if you wanted me safe you would have-"  
  
"what? left ferelden to anora? let loghain kill us? what was i to do, _your majesty_?"  
  
he recoils at the title. she's always been distant after the landsmeet but never had she referred to him as anything other than alistair. the title seeps into his bones and he feels too tired for this, too weary. he doesn't want to argue anymore. he opens his mouth to say something, but he's interrupted by the winter palace's bells, signalling everyone to reenter the ballroom.   
  
"come on." leliana whispers to alistair, tugging him away from surana who looks at him with an unreadable expression. she stears him towards the guest suites and leaves him in his room.   
  
the next day, the inquisition leaves the winter palace with two new advisors. alistair leaves lighter, a wilted rose resting on a bedside table, forgotten. he's not sure what it means for him, but he doesn't stick around long enough to know. 


End file.
